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skier,
first off, i wouldn't use the point that stewart pokes fun at both sides to prove that he has an open mind or isn't married to a certain agenda. let's not forget that he has a vested interest in telling as many jokes as he can. the more people laugh, the more people watch his show and buy his books. more laughs = more dollars. stewart is many things, but a capitalist chiefly among them.
i think we're arguing two separate points here. your response was based on the premise that stewart was running a political satire show plain-and-simple and should be afforded the accompaning degrees of seriousness and accountability.
i will sidestep your premise by countering that political satire no longer exists in the way that it once did. we agree that The Daily Show is intended to be primarily satirical entertainment, and we've both argued that Crossfire and its ilk are also entertainment oriented programs. So, if the whole gamut from a comedian's sniping to allegedly serious political discussion is acknowledged to be entertainment... from what vantage point do we defend one show as being purely satirical if it is endemic to the way we view all televised political discourse?
Whether you, I, or Jon Stewart likes it or not... there are a lot of people who get their news and base their votes off his show. If it's all entertainment, surely there must be some point where Stewart stops hiding behind his format and starts taking responsibility for his show's impact if he sees fit to criticize other entertainers for not being as positive an influence as they could be.
So again, I think it is innaccurate to characterize stewart as an outside satirist commenting on another industry. He has made himself a part of the same machine, just on the extreme buffoonery side of things. we've lost the separation between sober political news and entertainment. with this new paradigm comes new responsibility from our brand-new entertainers and a renewed awareness among the voting public.
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If you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance for survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.
~ Winston Churchill
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